Ability, Probability and Luck
by Amlia B
Summary: And a touch of bravery. A mysterious golden box turns up in Camelot, carrying with it a bored Pharaoh. Fortunately for everyone involved, Merlin has had much experience with royals. Especially the brattish ones. Season Zero!Yami Yugi.


**A/N:** Well... Seems I have a knack for peculiar xovers. All NatTak's fault, really. Kudos to her for being a beautiful beta and a strange source of inspiration. Enjoy the reading!

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 **Ability, Probability and Luck**

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Quite frankly, both Merlin and Gaius were at loss.

"So…" The warlock started hesitantly, gazing distrustfully at the golden box in the gloved healer's hands. "This is what caused Percival's condition?"

The king nodded gravely, regal head tall, strong arms crossed and deep bruises under his eyes. "A man with white robes left it at his feet and vanished. Percival just touched it, and suddenly collapsed." Arthur took a hand to his brow, as if to scratch the tension there away.

Merlin huffed, both angry at his king and himself. This wouldn't have happened if Arthur hadn't ordered him to stay. 'It's just a scheduled patrol', the great oaf had said this morning, 'make yourself useful and clean the stables', he had suggested with a hand wave.

Well, there was Percival, eyes open but unseeing, unresponding. All because of a mysterious golden box with symbols no one had ever seen, not even Gaius, by the confused and lost gaze he bestowed over the artefact.

"What sorcery is this?" Camelot's King inquired, his somber tone reminding Merlin it wasn't the time to point fingers. He felt guilty for forgetting the solemnity of the situation.

"I confess to have never seen something like this, sire," Gaius admitted with his usual frankness, turning the relic this way and that way. He candidly set it down and slowly opened the lid. Merlin hold his breath.

Gaius set the cover down, his thin eyebrows climbed suddenly. "How interesting," he mused, taking small pieces of gold from the box.

"Is that some sort of coins' storage?" Gwaine asked, approaching as if to pluck a piece from the table.

Arthur immediately bated his hands away. "Don't touch it!" The knight sheepishly brought his hand back.

Merlin turned his attention to the pieces. He realised each one had a different form than the other. Those didn't look like currency.

They were of a pure gold, shining as if coated in the sunlight, even though it was late into the night. They gleamed almost ominously, as if hiding hundred years old mysteries. Under the warlock's eyes, they preened, seductively. Dark magic was abruptly heavy in Merlin's tongue.

Make that a thousand years.

Gaius exchanged meaningful looks with his apprentice.

"I will consult the books, to find both cure to Percival's torment and answers for this object." He returned the pieces to the box, setting the lid with a final thud.

King and knight turned forlornly to go, brows heavy and steps slow. Arthur turned abruptly. "Merlin–"

"I will need his assistance tonight, my lord." Gaius bowed slightly. The king casted one last look at the box and nodded.

"What have you felt?" The healer questioned after the door closed.

"The darkest magic I have ever met." Merlin sourly muttered, kneeling closer to the box. "And the oldest as well."

"Oldest?" Gaius asked surprised. He crossed his arms, musing. "Judging by the unknown symbols, I expect it to be from far away lands," he explained. "However, I am aware of few things older than the Old Religion, save the mountains and forests themselves."

Merlin turned to his mentor. "I am certain of it, Gaius," he said with new fervour, excitement and dread battling in his chest. He inspected the unmistakable eye in the centre of the relic in a daze.

Gaius started to say something, but the warlock paid him no mind. The eye demanded all his attention.

It suddenly shined, golden rays flying out of the symbol.

How an object so dark, could produce such beautiful light? Was Merlin's last thought.

o.O.o

The warlock saw himself in a dark room.

One moment he had been kneeling in Gaius's room and the next he was standing, completely lost, in a most uncanny place.

It had infinite doors, some on the wall, most in the ceiling. He could not see an end to them.

That was doubtlessly a place born out of magic.

He could feel the pull much stronger now. The dark power buried there caused the warlock to hesitate briefly, but the memory of Percival's soulless eyes gave him strength.

He walked for what felt like an eternity. He tried doors, most opened under his hands. After the first trapped with deadly knives, he proceeded with caution.

He stepped on the walls and they became the floor. He jumped to the ceiling and landed flawlessly. Climbed the stairs upside-down and sideways.

He felt madness chewing at his mind. With a start, he realized the malady was not his own.

He trailed paths that seemed to have already been walked a thousand times by someone else, but met nobody.

Until he did.

When he found the door with the eye, he gave it no more attention than the dozens before.

He pushed it open, preparing to meet emptiness and march to the next. He would have missed the form seated upon the throne if not for the shining eye in the darkness.

"Erm…" Merlin eloquently put, so startled he was by the person.

"Another visitor so soon," the voice echoed. Shadows danced on the walls, leisurely crawling in Merlin's direction. "I wonder what he will do…"

"I have come to help my friend," Merin starts, after regaining his voice. "He has–"

"What about a game?" The person – boy, Merlin now notices – proposes, smiling widely and unstably at him.

Merlin is ready to shout in anger at the boy. How dare he make light of his friend's life? But he stops. He has a strange feeling.

The boy stands and the shadows retreat. He has the most bizarre hairstyle the sorcerer has ever seen. He wears golden bracelets and earrings; his blood red eyes are made sharper by dark lines. He presents an unmistakable golden circlet upon his brow.

This is a king.

"The other one, the brave knight, played." He added, a challenge. The king laughed, high and demented, but still aware. "Will you?"

"If I play," Merlin said, meeting those disturbing eyes, "will you restore Percival's health?"

The king shock his head at him, as if lamenting a child's ignorance. "I will return his soul from the Shadow Realm," he grinned wickedly, showing many teeth, "if you win."

"And if I lose?" Merlin inquired.

The boy opened his arms and bowed slightly, a mockery of introduction. "Your soul shall join his."

Merlin didn't think much. "Alright, but I choose the game."

The boy just nodded excitedly. The sorcerer hadn't said another word, but from the ground rose a table, with a wooden cup and two dices.

"Best out of three I suppose," the sorcerer mutered faintly as the king examined the dices. The boy turned to him conspiratorial. "Your friend and I played the same game. It seems you lack entertainment, wherever you are from," he commented serious, until breaking into maniac giggles.

"Oh, and remember," he pointed a finger at him, grinning widely, "if you cheat, there will be a penalty game."

Merlin dry swallowed, uncomfortable with the strange gleam shining in the king's eyes. The warlock was hit by realization, and shrugged innocently. "Let us play to the best of our abilities."

"Such a simple game." The king mused, analysing dice and cup. "Spin the dices in a cup, release them on the table while guessing the sum of the results. The winner: who is right with the highest sum." He put the dices in the cup and started gyrating. "Ability, probability and luck all working together." He smiled up at Merlin. "And a touch of bravery, of course." The warlock remained silent. It didn't feel like the other was quite finished.

He wasn't.

"Your friend was very brave," he smiled twistedly, with mad challenge in his eyes. "Are you?"

He released the cubes.

"Seven!"

Merlin hold his breath, willing the other to be wrong. The dices proved the boy right.

"You speak of bravery," was Merlin's taunt, thought he seethed inside. "But take the easiest number." The king was not intimidated, only shrugging and passing the cup along. "Probability," he said, both justifying and accusing.

The sorcerer spun the cup, as he had done dozens of times back at the tavern, and the dices flew as he called, bravely. "Eleven!"

The sum three made him swear. Both his guess and the result had the same chance of happening, but such coincidence was for naught. The king grinned conspiratorially. "You try to be brave," he lectured. "But you are just a fool."

"Be quiet and play," the warlock murmured, demure. The boy did just that.

"Eleven!"

The right sum made Merlin cover his mouth. The king laughed out loud at his expression. "Luck," he said, ominously.

His hand shook slightly as he took the cup. He had nothing to say.

"Seven!" Merlin declared, willing his voice not to tremble as he played safe.

Four and four glinted back at them.

The king did chuckle now, excitement and perversion twisting his features, his scarlet eyes squinting in glee. "So close." He took the dices and spined them in the cup. "Yet, so far." With a flourish, rolled them.

"Twelve," the king affirmed. To Merlin's delight, he was wrong. The boy was not bothered, thought. He was, afterall, ahead. "Bad luck," was his good-natured explanation

Merlin dragged a hand across his face. He had to beat that last play to win. He took the dice and cup, blew a kiss to them, and spinned.

Before releasing the dice, his eyes flashed gold.

Two six gleamed back at them. The highest sum of the game: twelve. The sorcerer grinned. "Well, seems I–"

"You were warned about cheating," the king proclaimed with a dangerous tone, lips still twisted around a smile. The shadows grew and squirmed again, taking shapes of nightmares and unearthly terrors."The door of shadows is open–"

"I have not cheated," Merlin declared, crossing his arms and locking his eyes with the boy's. The dark shapes froze mid twist as the king gazed thoughtfully at him, considering.

Merlin felt doubt creeping at him, and attempted bravery one last time. "Magic is no less part of me than my hand or eyes," he paused, thinking. "Ability," he reckoned with a checkmate's finality.

The King was emotionless for a few instants, bestowing an unreadable gaze at the warlock.

He suddenly burst into insane laughter, clapping his hands and bowing deeply to Merlin. "Well played, my friend," the king complimented, as the world started to shift around Merlin, the stones dissolving as a mirage and the light fading fast. "May we meet again in another life, Merlin."

o.O.o

Merlin woke with a start.

"There you are, you useless servant." A pillow was throw at him. The warlock jumped. He was at Arthur's desk, apparently having fallen asleep as he organized the king's lessons.

"Go make yourself useful," the king suggested.

Merlin stood in a daze. He felt like waking up from a strange dream and seemed to have forgotten something important. A peculiar feeling took hold of him. "Is Percival alright?"

Arthur let go of the chain mail he had been entertained with and turned to his assistant with pure exasperation. "Of course he is," he glanced at Merlin's still confounded face. "Why wouldn't he? Did something happen?"

"No," the warlock answered slowly, scratching his head. "I don't think anything happened."

o.O.o

"I am not sure, Mou Hitori no Boku," Yugi told the spirit, gazing at the spellcaster's card in his hands. "He has some interesting abilities, but we don't have many Noble Knight cards."

The Pharaoh agreed with Yugi, but he had a strange feeling as he gazed at the card.

"Just trust me, Aibou," he smiled at his companion. "I have a feeling Melin will not disappoint us."

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A/N: There is a Merlin card! Just look it up in yugioh wikia.


End file.
